《Lincoln_The film review Monica Jin》.docxVIP

Sitting through the first half hour of “Lincoln”, with its dry, uninteresting depiction of 19th-century American politics, I nearly believed that the film would be filed under my dislikes, even if Steven Spielberg directs the movie. But then I was proven wrong. “Lincoln”?is an epic achievement. Smart, inspiring and bold, the film shows a vision for what government can be and what it can do. It presents a road map for sensible political compromise in the pursuit of historic and important goals. And it paints a compelling portrait of Abraham Lincoln as a flawed, imperfect man who is nonetheless a genius and a once-in-a-generation visionary. The film does not focus on the life of Abraham Lincoln, but rather on his tremendous leadership in the final four months of his presidency. The film accurately presents the Thirteenth Amendment — the amendment that abolished slavery — as the fulfillment and guarantor of the Emancipation Proclamation. Amazingly, at least to me, the film accurately showcases Lincoln’s thinking on precisely this point. It gives much insight in the acuity of Lincoln’s thoughts on things that really mattered. I am greatly impressed with Lincolns amazing depth of thought and wisdom. At one point in the film, he roams the hallways of the White House at 3 a.m. pondering whether or not he should pardon some young deserters. Indeed, he spends much of his time contemplating; his political enemies interpret this as a lack of decisiveness and intelligence on the presidents part. As it ends up, he is much wiser than his counterparties could ever imagine. Lincoln is the president who determines to fight the war rather than accept disunion. He is the president who turns the war into “a new birth of freedom.” He is the president who declines to accept anything less than the unconditional surrender of the forces of the Confederacy. He is the president that Lincoln never flinches （畏惧；退缩）from the conflicts of morality that the president faced. It never paints him as